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Racism Round-Up 4.8.15

In the eyes of some USAmerican citizens, we are living in a ‘post-racial’ society. In other words, here in the United States of America, racism is a thing of the past. What these people never explain is how this supposed ‘post-racial’ society was achieved. They offer no explanation for what happened to the racist opinions held by many U.S. citizens-many of whom are still alive. Did the Civil Rights Act magically erase all racist views-conscious and unconscious-of bigoted white people in this country? Or did racist white USAmericans sit up in the wake of Martin Luther King, Jr’s death and reject all their racist beliefs? Was the USAmerican criminal justice system overhauled while no one was looking? When did African-Americans gain the same political, economic, and social power of white people? Those who believe we’ve moved past racism have offered no explanations for how we’ve reached this post-racial utopia, but they have offered evidence of their claim: President Obama. Uh-huh. I’m just a wee bit underwhelmed by such “evidence”. It is a fact that we do have an African-American President (yes, President Obama is a USAmerican citizen, contrary to the idiotic claims of birthers like Donald Trump). It is also a fact that the Department of Justice’s Ferguson Report documented numerous examples of individual and systemic racism within the Ferguson PD. Clearly the presence of a black man in the Oval Office does not mean that racism is over (even if a black man as President meant racism against black people was over, what about racism against other racial groups like Hispanic-Americans, Asian-Americans, and American Indians?). Aside from that, I have seen nothing else offered up as proof that we live in a ‘post-racial’ society. In contrast, I’ve seen plenty of evidence showing that racism is alive and well in the United States. On the macro-level, there is ampleevidence demonstrating that systemic racismpermeates society, especially our criminal justice system (this is a great resource for people who don’t understand what systemic racism is). On the individual, micro-level, racism occurs all the time. Here are a handful of recent examples of racism on the individual level (and one of systemic racism):

Donna Slawsky, who owns the Arts & Eats Restaurant and Gallery with her husband in Bradenton, said the message was left on their business phone line by someone who identified himself as KKK member Ralph Edward.

“I’m the leader of the KKK in this area, and I’d like you people to leave this neighborhood now,” the message said. “We don’t want you here no more. Get the f*ck out.”

Slawsky said her husband, Jim Copening, recently had a confrontation with two men who threatened to send their “friends from the KKK” after him, although they aren’t sure the incidents are related.

Copening had a message of his own to share with whoever left him the threatening voice mail.

“What I want to say to them?” he said. “‘You’re a coward, brother — you need to go work your stuff out, but not over here. I didn’t come to your place starting nonsense with you, so don’t come to mine.’”

I’m somewhat torn on this one. On the one hand, I do think the university should have taken measures to punish the students, but I don’t think they needed to expel them. I think that’s going to make them even more embittered and doesn’t serve the goal of combating racism. They needed to face some form of punishment, but I also think they needed some mandatory classes on diversity, or something aimed at chipping away at the racial biases and stereotypes they hold.

Their conduct was “a clear violation of our community standards,” President John Bravman said in an email to staff and students late on Monday.

One of the students used a derogatory term for black people, another said: “Black people should be dead,” and a third said: “Lynch ‘em” during a March 20 broadcast on WVBU, Bucknell’s student-run radio station, Bravman said in his email.

The expulsions were among several recent moves by U.S. colleges and universities to deal with racism on campus.

About 3,600 students attend Bucknell, located in the central Pennsylvania town of Lewisburg.

The Bucknell radio broadcast was heard by a local prison inmate, who contacted the Lewisburg Prison Project.

Dave Sprout, a paralegal at the inmate support organization, said he contacted Bucknell, and school officials reviewed tapes of the broadcast.

Sprout said the federal penitentiary in Lewisburg had more than 1,300 inmates, many of whom listen to Bucknell’s radio station.

“Racism exists on campuses across the country and, in fact, throughout society,” Bucknell’s president wrote in his email. “We need to look no further than recent news headlines to see that.”

Connecticut College canceled all classes on Monday to hold campus-wide counseling and discussions after an offensive posting was found on a professor’s Facebook page and racist graffiti in a restroom.

The judge went a step further and told a story about an African-American bootlegger in the county who used the nickname “N–ger Bob.”

McCaysville Police Officer Michael Early was in the courtroom. “I overheard the n-word followed by ‘Ray,’” he told a Fox 5 reporter. Early also confirmed, in a written statement, that more than one person used the n-word in court that morning.

The judge’s defenders said the context is misunderstood. Bradley and the deputies were referring to Green’s street name, they explained to Fox 5. But Green said he doesn’t have a street name, and no one had ever called him “N–ger Ray” before this incident.

“It hurts. It still hurts right now,” Green said in an interview. “It’s a subject that my grandfather, my great-grandfather, had to deal with. Not me.”

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If we lived in a post-racial USAmerica, there would be no racist asshats posting shit like this on Twitter:

That racist-as-fuck Tweet came from someone who got angry over a speechFirst Lady Michelle Obama gave at BET’s Black Girls Rock:

When I was a girl, I had parents that loved and believed in me, but those doubts still worked their way into my head. and I was always worried about something. Does my hair look right? Am I too tall? Do I raise my hand too much in class? So when folks said a girl like me shouldn’t aspire to go to the very best colleges in the country I thought ‘Maybe they’re right.’

But eventually I learned that each of those doubts were like a little test. . . that I could either shrink away from or rise up to meet and I decided to rise.

Yes, I decided to rewrite those tired old scripts that define too many of us. I decided that I wasn’t bossy, I was confident and strong. I wasn’t loud, I was a young woman with something important to say and when I looked in the mirror I say a tall, beautiful and smart black girl. … and that’s what I want for you, I want you to live life on your own terms. … but anyone who’s achieved anything in life knows that challenges and failures are necessary components of success. They know that when things get hard, that’s not always a sign that you’re doing some thing wrong, that’s often a sign that you’re doing something right. Those hard times are what shape you into the person you’re meant to be.

Yeah. Racism in this country is a thing of the past. Is it possible to roll your eyes so hard they fall out of their sockets?

In the cities where black families have the highest incomes, white families still typically make about 40 percent more, according to a new report. The report comes 50 years after Martin Luther King Jr.’s historic march from Selma to Montgomery, and shows the prosperity gap between the races.

In Washington, D.C., Arlington, Md., and Alexandria, W.Va.—the cities with the highest median incomes for both blacks and whites — the $108,254 median income for whites dwarfs the comparative $64,663 figure for black families. A similar income gap also exists in the cities where median household incomes for the two groups are the lowest, the National Urban League found in its Equality Index report. The San Francisco, Oakland and Hayward areas in California are the least equal between blacks and whites in terms of household earnings. Median black income in those places is $39,902 vs. $95,285 for whites.

Similarly, unemployment among blacks in the U.S. is much higher. The rate for whites is 5.3 percent, compared to 11.3 percent for blacks. The gap widens further in certain metro areas. Jackson, Mississippi, has the highest such gap, with 14 percent of blacks unemployed and 3.9 percent of whites.

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One thought on “Racism Round-Up 4.8.15”

Well apparently it’s over because White people, the primary perpetrators of racism and the ones who benefit the most from it, have declared it to be over.

I would argue, that the election of a Black president, made racists much more blatant about their BS. This s*** is just out in the wide open, now. I imagine if we get a female president, men who hate women, will declare misogyny to be a thing of the past.

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